Very loud sounds ...

[Dave2002]

I'm amazed that the eruption described in this article was estimated at over 172 dB, or that there was any means of measuring it at the time. Krakatoa 1883.

A barometer at the Batavia gasworks (100 miles away from Krakatoa) registered the ensuing spike in pressure at over 2.5 inches of mercury.

https://getpocket.com/explore/item/the-sound-so-loud-that-it-circled-the-earth-four-times

[Serial_Apologist]

They had yet to formulate the Big Bang Theory!

[Petrushka]

On November 27 1944 an RAF munitions dump of 4000 tons of bombs at Fauld in Staffordshire accidentally exploded in what has been called the greatest non nuclear explosion in history. Today, a massive crater serves as a reminder of an explosion that was heard in Manchester, damaged buildings in Derby and Burton and registered as an earthquake on seismographs in Casablanca.

Wartime secrecy meant that it was hushed up and even 76 years later hardly anyone has heard about it, yet it was bigger than the recent Beirut explosion. 70 people died and houses and farm animals were simply swallowed up.

I live a few miles away and, as kids, we used to go down into the crater until it was later cordoned off by the MOD. Apparently, there are enough bombs still down there to set off a bigger bang still, yet it would be more dangerous to disturb them so they will lie there for ever more.

Both my late parents remembered it well as do many who still live locally.

As very loud sounds go this must have been up there with the loudest.

[teamsaint]

I was woken up one morning by the sound of a greek war ship loosing off a few volleys from its guns( presumably blanks ! ) in Hydra harbour. We had no idea it had sailed in early in the morning, and as you can imagine from the picture it completely dominated the harbour.I think it must have moored just outside the harbour wall , in the bottom RH corner.
It was pretty loud, to say the least. We were sleepin in a 30 ft yacht moored in the harbour.

This is Hydra, which is a bit of an upmarket island retreat for the well heeled, famed for its jewellery.

https://images.app.goo.gl/R5oGasqAgksUMHJRA

[Cockney Sparrow]

I was woken by what I later found out was the Buncefield Oil storage explosion - living in an adjacent town. I wasn't aware of what had made me wake up, but I must have sensed something because I went to check our gas boiler (in an integral garage). A colleague, even further away but with only open country intervening, told me his house shook and he thought there might have been damage to the house (windows etc).

[kernelbogey]

The Halifax Explosion of December 1917 appears to be the largest accidental non-nuclear man-made explosion.

[Petrushka]

On November 27 1944 an RAF munitions dump of 4000 tons of bombs at Fauld in Staffordshire accidentally exploded in what has been called the greatest non nuclear explosion in history. Today, a massive crater serves as a reminder of an explosion that was heard in Manchester, damaged buildings in Derby and Burton and registered as an earthquake on seismographs in Casablanca.

Wartime secrecy meant that it was hushed up and even 76 years later hardly anyone has heard about it, yet it was bigger than the recent Beirut explosion. 70 people died and houses and farm animals were simply swallowed up.

I live a few miles away and, as kids, we used to go down into the crater until it was later cordoned off by the MOD. Apparently, there are enough bombs still down there to set off a bigger bang still, yet it would be more dangerous to disturb them so they will lie there for ever more.

Both my late parents remembered it well as do many who still live locally.

As very loud sounds go this must have been up there with the loudest.

Details of the RAF Fauld explosion here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAF_Fauld_explosion

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

The headline "The Sound So Loud That It Circled the Earth Four Times" is an interestingly untrue piece of journalese. The tsunami effects of the volcano circled the southern hemisphere 4 times, but that isn't the same thing.

[Serial_Apologist]

On November 27 1944 an RAF munitions dump of 4000 tons of bombs at Fauld in Staffordshire accidentally exploded in what has been called the greatest non nuclear explosion in history. Today, a massive crater serves as a reminder of an explosion that was heard in Manchester, damaged buildings in Derby and Burton and registered as an earthquake on seismographs in Casablanca.

Wartime secrecy meant that it was hushed up and even 76 years later hardly anyone has heard about it, yet it was bigger than the recent Beirut explosion. 70 people died and houses and farm animals were simply swallowed up.

I live a few miles away and, as kids, we used to go down into the crater until it was later cordoned off by the MOD. Apparently, there are enough bombs still down there to set off a bigger bang still, yet it would be more dangerous to disturb them so they will lie there for ever more.

Both my late parents remembered it well as do many who still live locally.

As very loud sounds go this must have been up there with the loudest.

How extraordinary! I would think that if there were still to be any remaining bombs in that crater, they would have been ignited when the original explosion occurred, and so probably safe now.

[Anastasius]

We live within a stones' throw of RAF Spadeadam (Spadeadam of Blue Streak 'fame'). Part of the site is shared with DNV-GL - a top-rate specialist engineering company specialising in the constructive destruction of gas pipelines and all things gas (explosions). Quite regularly, there will be a rather loud thump and the windows and doors will rattle. We're two miles away ! Not quite on the scale of those above but exciting enough. I rather like them but my wife has other views. Just recently Carlisle has given permission for an offshoot of AWE (Atomic Weapons Establishment) to expand their facilities there. https://www.newsandstar.co.uk/news/1...rian-raf-base/

So if in a few months time my posts strat too gt confuzed youl no y thwt cbdh ckkck kdksi zzzzz.....z.

[Belgrove]

The headline "The Sound So Loud That It Circled the Earth Four Times" is an interestingly untrue piece of journalese. The tsunami effects of the volcano circled the southern hemisphere 4 times, but that isn't the same thing.

Not so. The report commissioned by the Royal Society in 1888, edited by G Symonds

https://archive.org/stream/eruptionkrakato00whipgoog#page/n12/mode/2up

contains a wealth of detail (including beautifully produced colour plates of the subsequent unusual atmospheric phenomena). The section on ‘air waves’, shows that up to seven passages of a pressures wave originating from the explosion site was recorded by meteorological stations throughout the world. Six passages of the wave (i.e three times around the world) was observed at Greenwich, separated by about 35 hours.

It is estimated that the power of the explosion was equivalent to 200MT of TNT. The largest nuclear explosion was the Tsar Bomba, estimated by the Russians to have a power of 50MT. Krakatoa is most certainly the largest bang in recorded history.

[gradus]

In a concert hall, Tennstedt conducting Mahler 8, deafening the mid-stalls in the first movement.

[Petrushka]

In a concert hall, Tennstedt conducting Mahler 8, deafening the mid-stalls in the first movement.

I, too, was in mid-stalls for that one (I went to the Sunday afternoon performance 27/1/91) and yes it did go off the Richter scale!

However, I think that the loudest I've heard in the concert hall was Richard Strauss' Festliches Präludium at the Proms one year cowering in O stalls and fearing hearing damage!

[Dave2002]

Hemel Hempstead Pavilion - years ago. Walton 1st Symphony conducted by Rhozdestvensky in 1979. The venue has now been demolished (2002) - since the sounds inside it failed to hasten its collapse.

That performance showed what happens when a conductor insists on the dynamic markings, yet takes no account of the acoustic environment. It was painful!

There was also Shostakovich 5 in the same concert, but judging by the levels of pain experienced, that was slightly quieter.

https://genome.ch.bbc.co.uk/schedules/radio3/1979-04-06

https://www.architecture.com/image-library/RIBApix/image-information/poster/dacorum-pavilion-hemel-hempstead-hertfordshire-the-auditorium/posterid/RIBA51017.html